Friends, Visa & Adolescent Memories
Welcome to another episode of The Chirp. If you didn't get a chance to check out our previous episode, you'll certainly want to take the time to listen to Story 1: Don't Get Married In Your 20's. For this episode, take some time to listen to Geoff Speiran - a business minded mogul living in Panama juggling friendships, finances, and unexpected asks for money.
This Episode In A Nutshell
Friendships make life worth living. We go out with our friends, we laugh with our friends, we eat with our friends, and most of all we try to live the best lives we can with our friends. However, sometimes those friendships fade away and we forget about them. But what if, a friendship you long cherished that dissolved over time, surprisingly came back - but this time, with a request for money. Listen to Geoff as he tells stories about his childhood in Dublin, fond memories he shares with his cherished friends, and a disturbing tale of an "ask for money" from a once trusted acquaintance.
You'll find this episode of The Chirp on:
Or wherever you listen to your podcasts.
Have a story to tell and want to be on our podcast? Let us know by sending an email to claird@pigeonloans.io.
Audio Transcript of If We're Such Good Friends, Why Are You Contacting Me?
Opening Monologue
Hello everyone! Welcome back to The Chirp, a podcast where we chat about how relationships have been affected by money and loans and how we all learn from these experiences.
If this is your first time joining us on the Chirp, please give us a like, a follow, subscribe, depending on what platform you're on, and please give us a review. We release episodes every fortnight, and this enables us to be on your front porch ready to be consumed on the day.
This week I had the pleasure of chatting to my best friend for many, many years, Mr. Geoff Speiran. While we both used to live together in Dublin, Ireland, Geoff now works in Panama for Diageo, a multinational alcohol beverage company, where he is a business development manager for airlines and cruise ships.
Now while we conducted this interview from opposite sides of the globe, it was as normal for me as if we were in the same room. I knew he’d make an excellent guest for The Chirp as we grew up together and witnessed many examples of relationships being strained by money.
I’ve known Geoff for nearly 20 years, and it was great to hear some tales he had on loans with friends putting a spanner in the works sometimes, some tales more recent than others!
Let’s dive into the interview and allow me to introduce my old comrade, Geoff.
Interview
Cameron Laird
Geoff, thank you so much for chatting to me today. How goes it in Panama at the moment?
Geoff Speiran
Hey Cameron, how are things? Panama goes well, I'm currently on a small island off the coast of Panama called Baucus Del Toro. So I've temporarily relocated. I’m a digital nomad, an opportunity that I'm given at the moment which is grateful. So I'm here for another two, three weeks at the moment.
Cameron Laird
Are there digital nomads where you are at the moment? Is it a kind of a little hub for them, or did you find this little island off the coast?
Geoff Speiran
I actually came a year ago, October last year, it was the very first day Panama opened. It was like the first place where there was almost no restrictions. However, we flew out here, it's like a 30 minute flight from Panama City. All the restaurants were closed, all the hotels were closed, the only place that was open was where we were staying. So that's how we found it. But very much it's like a digital hub center. A lot of Americans, a lot of people coming from, from Latin America as well. So you got an eclectic mix of people like I'm in a cohort again for the last two weeks and it's super busy as it's a lot a lot of people so it's nice. The only thing we have is rolling blackouts, which you got to be careful for.
Cameron Laird
What are they? As in like electricity gonezo?
Geoff Speiran
If it rains too hard, the electricity is gone for a day or two days, we were where we used to live before. We were on a small beach called playa now, I thought that power would go out for like two or three days at a time. And then we'd have to figure out how to get work done and stuff. There's one hotel that had a generator that we used to be able to get to.
Cameron Laird
That would fill me with so much anxiety. If you had shit to do if you've stopped to do during the day and you're like oh, I'm sorry, boss, please don't fire me. I don't have any electricity, nevermind any WiFi. How did you explain that?
Geoff Speiran
I like how you thought about work. I thought about food. I was like my fridge freezer is gone. All my food is destroyed. What am I gonna do? How am I going to eat? So I like it. You were like, how am I gonna keep my job? I said there's like two hotels, the hot generators where we could make base camp out of and get our work done. But it was more that it gets dark at six o'clock every day. So that is not like daylight savings in Panama. So you basically want to go at six o'clock, it's dark, and you need to flash light out because there's no streetlights where we were. It was a really small beach town. It was one road, five shops, and a couple of hotels.
Cameron Laird
So Geoff, tell me how you ended up in Panama. Obviously, for our listeners at home, we grew up in Dublin, Ireland together. I’m now based in Spain. You're now based in Panama. And you've been abroad and working abroad a lot longer than I have. So can you tell me a little bit how you went from, you know, both finishing school and finishing college in Dublin to getting going all the way to Panama?
Geoff Speiran
Yeah, I mean, it seems to be like a journey that had 1000 stops along the way. But each one was hugely significant. And kind of, if it hadn't been for a single journey, I probably wouldn't have ended up where I am. And it all really started with taking off Spanish in university and then going away for a year abroad and learning Spanish in a small town called Ciudad de Our. So I think once you've lived abroad, and you have that independence or something that you want to maintain and keep at any given cost. I think we both know that renting and doing that at the moment, and certainly for the last number of years, has been outside of our reach. So looking inwardly, like it was just absolutely crazy. And it's indicative of where all of our friends live as well. We could go on a whole other podcast about where everyone's at at the moment. But all that wonders of the globe. all four corners, certainly so for me there was Spain as the first element or first taste of freedom, then obviously had the language capabilities. I managed to maintain those finished university and really wanted to get out and explore the world again and was offered a job in Florida working in a private member's site working in a private member's Country Club, which was great fun. But it was crazy, tough work. small town called Vero Beach, made some amazing friends for life though I've met my current fiance. So it definitely left a good imprint. And as a result, America has always been close to my heart. So yes, that again kind of fed into what I wanted to do. I was a bartender there, I wanted to move into the brand ambassadorial world and while I was living in Vero Beach in the US, I applied for a job as a brand ambassador and subsequently got the job. I lived in London for about two years. While I was doing that, and then the company had set up an Irish Whiskey distillery in Dublin, relocated to Dublin, moved in with my folks, because that was all we could afford to do at the time. I mean, renting again was crazy. My fiancé, my girlfriend at the time, was studying in a final year college so we bought work working full time, which of course makes things super challenging financially. And I was at a conference in France at an Irish bar. And I bumped into the gentleman who was now my manager, I was hosting an event. And we got talking and he took my card and added me on LinkedIn, the old the old fashioned way. And hashtag network later, hashtag networking. Exactly. Hopefully, weeks later, I got an inbox to say hi, I'm the head of Americas Are you would you be interested in relocating? And after much deliberation, and not a lot of knowledge around Panama I figured it was like a perfect storm of being able to pick up Spanish being closer to America challenging myself in a new role with a new company. I'd have to have absolutely loved this even though I moved here three days or four days before the pandemic like really kicked in and so Panama has its tremendous places. It's definitely a hidden gem like most people think of the canal but there's a lot to love and appreciate around here as well.
Cameron Laird
We've definitely had we've been blessed I think the parables you know, growing up together as well and our family homes being quite close that we always have had kind of that safety net to fall back on. Should things be going awry? And especially with accommodation now but there's one thing and there's one thing I you know I love about you and when we grew up together and you know, went to school, you know, dare I say became men together was the kind of the similarity we always had was we always had to work as soon as we could, you know, growing up as teenagers because we weren't getting any handouts from the family. And so I'm keen to ask you because obviously you know, here you are, it's been a long and winding road, always, always ascending. I was working from such a young age and you know, earning from such a young age shapes how you handle your money and your finances today?
Geoff Speiran
I think it's two things. One is what were we 16 years old, and 2008 so like we became part of the sort of generation that we're out of age we really understand like somewhat understand finances money, and what money can get you and what the value of it is in some capacity and...
Cameron Laird
Not to mention the recession happening as well.
Geoff Speiran
So that's my point, which is that it’s obviously a huge financial crisis. So obviously I had a huge bearing in like our then value and how we think money works for us. So as you said, like there was, there wasn't a lot going around back then. And I was lucky that I had done a couple of shifts with different buyers from the age of 15. My dad always said, always remember him telling me that bartending is like a trade you can really bring it anywhere around the world. And like again, every road and every journey has got me to where I am and if I hadn't begun bartending, to get me through college to get me my kind of money that I needed, I wouldn't have gone to Florida to become a bartender I wouldn't have become a brand ambassador and I could be living somewhere completely differently. So it all kind of circles back around in that respect. But I think in working everyone should work in either hospitality or retail. I think having something that's your own and earning and working as part of a team in any capacity at an early age helps kind of form really good habits. I think the formation of those good habits drives how you then want to spend and utilize your money. Yeah, and how you plan to use your money, because I've worked in zero hour contracts and I've worked where minimum wage jobs and I worked in jobs where you could just be doing events like all different bartending things and it was extremely hard to say off manage here and I'll try and do this and there was no Etoro there was no Robinhood there was no real way of kind of understanding what my money could be used for other than going out with friends and and spend the frivolous frivolously so that's kind of what we did. But I think from an early age you put in the right markers to say okay, I do enjoy having my own finances, I do enjoy actually managing these myself. And like any 18 to 20 year old would know you still managed to spend it on. For me it was always about traveling, whether that was summers abroad, various different aspects that I always wanted to do - I want to go out there and see a bit of the world and I was very lucky to be able to afford that and through different jobs. So I mean yourself, what was your first job Cam, you remember?
Cameron Laird
I worked in a supermarket in Dublin called Tescos, and that was my very first job. I was 16 very close to home. I think I was on like 11 euro an hour, which was well for a 16 year old. Yeah, it was because no other 16 year old was working when I was working and I had to because the recession was was you know it hit hard. But um and it's funny you say that because we did used to think when we were all kind of 18. And going forward from that we all were working. But one thing that I've, you know, always always spoken about is the fact that we all grew up having to lend each other money, we all grew up having to, you know, sort out a kind of a roster of loans, if you will, between each other. Because if we didn't, there would have been a couple of people left by the wayside who would have wouldn't have been able to go to a party in which I suppose was the main focus of those years wasn't it?
Geoff Speiran
I mean, there'll be no point in going out if your best friends couldn't join you, right? That was what we wanted to do. And one person will be getting paid the following Friday and the next person the following Friday, and it was always just sort of handed back and dealt back. And I mean, we made it work. We formed lifelong friendships throughout those years and think, I mean, I always see it like, either it's on Instagram or Facebook. Who do you know, more than five years I'm thinking? I know some of these old friends like 15 years at this stage. And we're all really, really close still. And I think I don't know whether our secret loan system works back then. And that's what helped galvanize us.
Cameron Laird
And I think as well, what was the big, you know, contributor was the fact that we were students as well, and going out and having these incredibly cheap drinks and not having to pay too much to get into the nightclubs and things like that. But I think today the loan system worked with all of us. If we were to go out to our homes these days, I think, you know, I think that the numbers would be a lot larger.
Geoff Speiran
The numbers would be larger, but it'd be a lot easier, right? Nowadays, it's like we didn't even have proper mobile phones really, like what could we do to text each other by pressing letters, three to knock certain numbers three times to get each individual letter like nowadays, you do it 100 different ways. 100 different apps, send people money, keep track of a hell of a lot better, like I'm sure, there's certain money that went under the radar. But I think even with lending friends money, it can always be a little bit of a risk. But there's a great quote, I think it's in a Bronx tale. And he's talking about how like, I gave this guy $20. So if they never give it back to you, you got rid of the guy for $20. So I haven't taken that approach with all my friends. But I definitely gave money to people in the past thinking like, oh, cool, no problem. We're friends. Like, you'll get that back to me. And they've ghosted you or they've completely abandoned you. So I think that quote has always sort of stuck to me in some way or another that, hey, if I lend someone money, and I never see them again, then that's all it took to get rid of a scumbag in my life, which is cheap, right?
Cameron Laird
Exactly. There's a reason why that person didn't pay me back. Absolutely. And the thing is, well, that was a big thing. The other positive, we talked about the positive when we were all used to, you know, sort each other out and dig each other out when it was time to go out and stuff. But there was these kind of negative, you know, situations or scenarios where friends were, you know, because we weren't incredibly wealthy, we were kids, we were students, we weren't working full time, like we are now. So the work of times where money wasn't returned, and relationships were definitely strained. But, you know, at the end of the day, we were kids, but in this day and age now because we're both you know, 30 and thriving, as they say, really enduring well you're Yeah, absolutely. But what kind of examples or stories happened to you recently where you know, relationships have been strained that you know, the excuse of being a kid just didn't suffice. I think...
Geoff Speiran
That your friends that you always want to believe in them and if someone comes to you and they really need help, like people who you have met in the past and you formed relationships with whether that's kind of acquaintance level or a much personal connection like you want to have that faith in people that I really need this for this project that I'm starting where I really need this cash for this visa or I really need this money for something and you kind of say, Well you know what, you're trying to make yourself trying to do something better you're not going to spend it on wasted and you're not gambling or anything else. So like, I'll give it to you of course I'll give it to your close friend and I hope I want the best year. Now recently, we did have a situation where we were contacted by someone who we met years ago who I met years and years ago who I'm friends with on Facebook and Instagram and would comment the time and and and loosely keep in touch, but now real direct kind of conversation. So I was quite shocked when I got a message like it was last week earlier this week saying - "Hi Geoff. Hope you're well Congrats. I hope things are good in Panama. Look, I need $300 for a visa. If I can't get my visa I can't get my job and I can't move to my new new country.". I've know this person for a long time. We've worked together and I was so taken aback firstly because they haven't been in touch and I don't know whether that's how to be unwise or how desperate they were, right? I mean, are they so desperate that they're combing through a friends group of old friends? And then you think about it, there's so many psychological impacts that go into your head as the person who's been asked. I think the first one that came into my head was actually frustration. Like, why, if you're in need, why did you contact me? On the deadline - you know, if we're such good friends...feel comfortable and open to come and talk to me about anything, personal, financial, or what have you. So I think the first thing was frustration there. And then you start to think. Okay, well, what's happened in this person's life that they don't have the ability to gather the $300 to get their visa for their new job? And why is there no other resource that they have? That's legitimate, like a banker, or any other particular way? So you start to go through these situations and, you know, you discuss it with partners, or discuss it with your close friends. And ultimately, we didn't actually. I didn't feel comfortable, I spoke to them. I said, hey, look, I don't know if this is necessary, I think I do, can you give me some more context? And then they just said - No, it's completely fine. Don't worry, I've got it sorted. Cheers. Good luck. And then never heard from them. Haven't heard from them since despite having followed up and say - Hey, did you get over? Did you get the visa? Where's the new job? So again, the emotional challenges like as a kid, if someone asks you for 50 quid, you're not thinking, why are they asking me? What's the understanding? Everyone's an adult, you try and actually put yourself in their perspective, a hell of a lot more. Yeah. And then yeah, as I said, I haven't heard from them since. So I do hope they got over if they listened. I mean, I hope they got there. I hope they got their visa, I hope everything went well for them. But my advice would be stay in contact with people who care and who you trust about and who want to be confiding things in because, you know, finances tear people apart very easily. And we've seen people come and go, and as I said, if it only cost X amount to get rid of them, whatever. But this wasn't that scenario, it was so much different. And so I hope that hope that person the best, but it was an unusual situation to be placed in, especially when it's like a Tuesday afternoon, and you're not even thinking of it.
Cameron Laird
Well, first and foremost, fairplay to you for getting back to that person. And you know, I know a lot of people that would have just been, you know, I would have seen that. I don't know how I would have reacted. I mean, if I saw that I probably wouldn't, I wouldn't have replied, responded straightaway, I would have been initially a bit taken aback, I would have initially been pissed off in the honest thing, because you are, it sounds to me as if this person kind of just sprayed the walls, hoping that something would would stick. It wasn't as if they were like, I'm only going to ask Geoff, and that's going to, you know, I think it sounds like he or she requested this, you know, let alone off a few people. And someone just kind of got back to them sooner. Do you kind of smell that from the situation?
Geoff Speiran
I do, unfortunately. And the question is like, how much do they actually need? It wasn't like a personalized message or anything. And then you just hope that they're not in in real trouble in any way. But yeah, again, you feel not to play the victim. I didn't feel like a victim in any way, shape, or form, I would have helped if I, if I even heard more from them or had more context. Yeah. But these are the sorts of dilemmas you have and you faced when you're a little bit older. But ultimately, decision was made for me, they didn't come back to me, they didn't hear back, I had in my head I would still if I if roles were reversed or not roles reversed rather, but if I was in the same position to do the same thing again. I think I would still proceed in the same way I would say hey, is everything okay? You know, what, what is the situation? I haven't heard from you in a really long time. You're out you're doing things you know, you're active. It's not like you've been a hermit or haven't been doing different things. So it is a surprise and a bit of a shock. But...
Cameron Laird
Does this person work? Like if they're like, in this day and age $300 isn't a huge sum of money too. Maybe that is to be asking of someone, but not to acquire in your own right? And do you think this person is suffering financially or did they just...
Geoff Speiran
It's you know, it's tough to say I don't think you ever really know what goes on in the background and and i think it happens a lot and I suppose I've just said it, but social media can can say one thing and the reality can be an entirely other situation. So even like now talking about it, I do type try and reflect and put myself in that position and say, Okay, well, yeah, you were doing that on social media, but you might have been doing it. You might be doing it for the wrong reasons and trying to live up to certain expectations or meeting people for the final time. Like, again, having someone who's moved abroad or loss. Yeah. And I think people are sick of going to just going away parties. Because there's been so many of them...
Cameron Laird
Yeah, I've been through them they've all been.
Geoff Speiran
They've all been very fun well of course therefore I can understand like you want to have that final send off with your friends and maybe you've overdone it or maybe something's happened and could be hospital bills you don't know things can be yeah for a whole number of reasons so..
Cameron Laird
How long are you abroad now?
Geoff Speiran
Florida for a year, and then I came back for six months...four months so I came back for four months, and then moved to London for two years, was in Dublin for 18 months and I've been in Panama for 18 months.
Cameron Laird
Did you ever feel any kind of fear or did anything ever happen where you were struggling financially you don't have to go into the details but is there a kind of a level of fear when living abroad or not having the safety net that we mentioned before is there always kind of that underlying fear of I really cannot mess this up?
Geoff Speiran
I have two stories, one's a funny story. And then the other one's a little more serious. The funny one is so when I was living in Spain, which is much much younger, I was like 21 or 22 and I was actually working I've got a job teaching English randomly. And there was a Spanish Festival on which is or Spanish like a religious festival which they turned into huge types of festivals all over the country. And we went out - we went out too many days in a row and I was like fully had 20 euro left for the rest of the week. And I was playing rugby with the team at the time. I literally told them this as a "gabion paniagua" like bread and water for the week but like in my head I was fully having bread and water for the week like I did it for two or three days I only was able to buy bread and bottled water or bread and water that was it and then I can train on a Tuesday, trained on a Thursday. On Thursday like how's the bread and water? I was like, no like that's literally all I have and then the team rallied together and gave me some food but I was like - no it's fine it's no big deal like you don't really think about it and you can see how quickly you can like normalize that situation as well.
Cameron Laird
That was the lack of protein that is kind of unsettling that whole scenario it definitely when you're trying to play rugby as well. Or you just kind of just carbohydrates and h2o. I don't know how long that would have lasted.
Geoff Speiran
They still messaged me like they would message me on Instagram or whatever they say like has the bread and water diet going for a bro and all this stuff. So like that was a funny version of it. And that was born out of not wanting to ask my parents for cash and saying like how I actually survive on on 20 euros for the whole week. Yeah, I try and just test yourself right? Second time around and look at as funny as it makes for the story. But the second time around was there was more recently and it wasn't even like I didn't feel like it was kind of like you're financially struggling boss. Living in London, it's very easy to let things run away from you. Like there's a huge like, it's very much the European style of any city of access that you would see in the US and I was trying to save you but you know, you do your best to save and try and put like little bits and bobs away because what the end goal at the time was trying to buy somewhere in Ireland, which is like think about that now it's crazy, but I was trying to think about buying a house there. That's the process that in my head I had. So again, again, I was working kind of full time wages are what I would consider to be graduate wages with full time and my own fault booked a holiday to eat to a month beforehand spent too much and then by the time the paycheck came around again, it was literally so short for a week living with people I'm both too afraid to kind of speak up and say anything and and eating whatever leftovers I had in my fridge in my freezer and kind of keeping it to the bare bones of what I could get in the discount. I was done. To be honest, all I was doing was protecting my own ego which looking back on it is stupid because the reality is I was living with people, any of them would have put up their hand and helped me - um, but yeah, it was my own naivety my own ego my own, I should be able to fend for myself. And of course, you can't do it all times. Like I was an idiot I spent too much money but you shouldn't be afraid to ask for help. Either with people who you know, and as I said, people who you can confide in. Absolutely, and that's...
Cameron Laird
A good contrast as well to your story but the friend that reached out looking for the 300 quid because while something is you know, abrupt as you know, reaching out having that request as opposed to actually just asking for help because you need us because you need to eat and you know, I think that's a it's a way easier loan to say yes to than having to kind of, you know, see someone's popping out of the ground and having to give them money.
Geoff Speiran
Yeah, exactly right. It's like, I'll provide you with food, but I won't. So that's, um, that's another kind of two times since then, I mean, thankfully, you know, I've been fortunate over the last over the last two years, being in a good job, that are able to make better financial decisions and plan better and the income is certainly more guaranteed than I had been particularly I was bartending or when I was teaching English, back in those days, so from that perspective, you learn, because it's, once you're receiving an income like that, you're like, Okay, well, now I can actually start planning and what does planning look like? Yeah, start to educate yourself in whether you're building templates for saving or whether you're building how I've seen like, loads, differences, the 50-30-20, there's the 10%. Like, there's all these different theories on it. I think that the one theory I've tried to adopt is, is no matter. I had a happy life when I lived in different parts of the world. And like, you think about how little you were able to have success and joy, I mean, success, nothing. I mean, just like success, like a day would be so much fun. And you wouldn't need to necessarily spend a whole truckload of money. And it's like, how do you think back to how happy something used to make you and whether. Do you need to then do lots more in excess to get that same reaction? I don't necessarily think you do. So looking at like, simple things. And I think being in Panama, you can get a lot of joy from the simple things, you can go for a dip in the sea, you can go for a beach walk, you can go for a hike in the jungle, the weather is a thing. So model. Yeah, the weather helps hugely. And that's always especially...
Cameron Laird
Being Irish, something will never take for granted. Thank you so much for chatting to me today. It's great to catch up and to share your stories with all of the listeners of the church. Any final words, words of wisdom?
Geoff Speiran
You know, again, I think back to like when we were young, and 2008. And we didn't have a whole lot of guidance, in terms of what to do financially and what like any sort of financial planning could look like. A lot of it's now kind of self taught. I mean, my mom was working at the bank, her best effort was like don't get a credit card. Do you get a credit card? Don't spend too much on the credit card. But what I'm supposed to do is - listen to podcasts about their finance, understand people's stories, understand the highs and lows. There's a whole plethora of really good material out there that you can audio watch on YouTube you can listen to in podcast form. So I mean, that's the main thing, right? Like knowledge, understanding the power that you do have. It just makes people have better informed financial decisions, which in the long run once you have, the first step to security is understanding what you're able to what your bargaining position, or your position is financially. So that's how I was helped. And that'll be my final tidbit or token of advice.
Outro Monologue
Well that was a little trip down memory lane for me. Great chatting about the college days when money was scarce, the recession was in full swing and we all had to help each other financially to create those nighttime memories.
One thing I realized from chatting to Geoff was that these awkward moments, these stories of people, chancing their arm, looking for money or loans, they never go away. These traits aren’t eliminated or eradicated from people who develop or mature. If you have money, there are always going to be people looking for it.
As Geoff said, the technology wasn’t in place when we were in college to lend money to each other efficiently. Cash had to swap hands, it had to be in person. It had to be a 2 day bank transfer. We didn't even have smartphones back then!
Then fast forward to Geoff's story about his neglectful pal who had asked for a sizable loan. Nothing to break the bank for some people, but nonetheless a cheeky amount. I had to agree with Geoff when I said that it wasn't something I'd be comfortable with, it wasn't a scenario that I'd want to be in.
But should Geoff have succumbed to his friends wishes and lent him the money, at least in this day and age, the technology exists to ensure that Geoff could lend out that cash, see that it's safe and structured, get it back over a specific period of time, and if he wanted to, add on interest as well.
Technology has changed everything, and compared to when me and Geoff were students, I think our money can be managed a little bit safer today. There's always risk, and there's always some risky characters, but a lot has changed in the last 10 years to make financial transactions a lot better!
That’s it for The Chirp today. Again, thank you so much for listening and watching and showing us love. We appreciate the support so please give us a follow and review so that we can keep it going for you!
We’ll be back in two weeks with a third story and we can’t wait to share it with you. Take care!
